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Everything is increasing – the traffic, the data, the access points, and the number of users and devices. -- Wieland Alge, vice president and GM EMEA, Barracuda.

Campbell, CA (PRWEB)December 20, 2013

A survey of more than 400 small, mid and large-sized enterprises has highlighted a fast-growing discrepancy between the capabilities of their network infrastructures and what network administrators need to do their jobs effectively. Approximately 52 percent admitted that managing application performance, availability and security is a significant problem due to a “disjointed, complex and hard-to-manage” environment.

The survey, conducted by Freeform Dynamics on behalf of security and storage leader, Barracuda Networks, Inc. (NYSE: CUDA), set out to identify the key issues affecting the performance of critical business applications. The findings indicated that many business networks are showing signs of stress when trying to keep up with the demands of the modern workplace.

“Everything is increasing – the traffic, the data, the access points, and the number of users and devices,” said Wieland Alge, vice president and GM EMEA, Barracuda. “The survey results underpin how important it is for companies to consider all of these points in order to scale their network infrastructure.”

Highlights from the survey results include:

•Just over one-fifth (21 percent) said employees connecting remotely are generating very high or high amounts of traffic on the network. Approximately 76 percent of those surveyed expect the load from employees connecting remotely to be higher or much higher within three years.
•Half (50 percent) of respondents said that growth in home working and/or other forms of remote access is impacting traffic on the corporate network.
•The vast majority (84 percent) cited current or future changes in working patterns as increasing the challenge associated with application access and security.
•More than half (52 percent) of those surveyed admit their network is a disjointed, complex and hard-to-manage environment, which impacts the ability to deliver consistent application performance, availability and security.

Additional findings from the survey indicated that poor or unpredictable application performance is causing a problem, or at least a distraction for almost two-thirds (65 percent) of those surveyed. Application outages also are impacting businesses, causing disruption in 64 percent of the businesses surveyed. With predictions that these issues are only set to increase, the respondents did recognize a need for change.

In addition to performance and availability issues, those surveyed also indicated that changes in work patterns and user expectations are impacting both information and application security. Almost two-thirds (63 percent) stated that changes in how data is used and moved pose a significant challenge when it comes to the security of accessing applications.

These changes are reflected with 81 percent of respondents recognizing that they need to move away from the “network perimeter” mind-set for security and embrace an “application perimeter” approach.

The survey responses highlight a change in working trends today, which is being led by employees rather than the IT department. This change combined with the expected increase in network loads from core applications, virtualization, collaboration systems and data intensive advanced communications systems further indicate a need to prepare networks to meet these rapidly escalating demands.

According to Tony Lock, director at Freeform Dynamics, the network perimeter today is very ill defined. Remote workers, mobile devices, partners, customers and suppliers all are trying to access company resources that have traditionally resided behind a corporate network firewall. He said, “If you have too many holes in a wall, it gets really hard to keep the bad guys out and the important/critical data in.”

One way of dealing with the combination of application performance and security challenges is to deploy Application Delivery Controller (ADC) type solutions. In this respect, the survey results are consistent with the mainstream market for ADCs being reasonably new, and knowledge and awareness being relatively limited, with just 27 percent of respondents having a form of ADC solution in place.

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The survey was conducted by independent research firm Freeform Dynamics in collaboration with The Register and surveyed 404 IT professionals in the UK, Europe, USA and the rest of the world, from a cross section of organization sizes and industries. The full findings of the study, Controlling Application Access: A Network Security and QoS Checkpoint, are available at https://copy.com/MbPmxjvzlYgT.

About Application Delivery Controllers (ADCs)
An application delivery controller (ADC) is a network device that manages client connections to complex web and enterprise applications. It can be deployed in a variety of form factors including hardware, virtual appliance, or software, and is responsible for managing or directing the flow of data between two entities.

Barracuda Load Balancer ADC
Designed for today’s high-traffic data centers, the Barracuda Load Balancer ADC is a high-performance application delivery controller that combines application acceleration, availability, and control with advanced security capabilities. Deployed by thousands of organizations worldwide, the Barracuda Load Balancer ADC is a robust, proven solution that manages and secures billions of application transactions daily. It is available as a multiport platform with fibre and copper network interfaces, as well as a virtual appliance. To learn more, visit: http://www.barracuda.com/adc.